A type of Empathic Environment, commonly used to indicate that a character is sad, disappointed, or just plain depressed. The rain is often called on to exaggerate their mood depending on how sad they are, or if their character is always like that, then this means that they're expressing true sadness for the first time. May be exaggerated to the point that the bad weather is restricted to a single Personal Raincloud following the character around.

The juxtaposition of rain and depression is also made frequently in Film Noir and similar settings, including Cyberpunk. After all, slogging about in the rain and mud, or being forced to stay indoors, will depress you pretty quickly.

Examples:

This begins right after Naruto and Sasuke's confrontation in episode 134, as Sasuke stares down at his unconscious rival, and continues as he stumbles off to Orochimaru while Kakashi starts hauling Naruto home.

Most of the time it rains when something bad happens to the Uchiha. It rained for Itachi back when we thought he was the Big Bad and during his and Sasuke's fight.

It also rained when the Third Hokage died and when his son Asuma died. There'a also a perpetual Gray Rain of Depression over the Hidden Rain Village; one of the characters even compares it to the country constantly crying.

The final dramatic climax of the Fruits Basket anime occurs in the rain, after the rest of it is sunny.

Occurs in Gankutsuou. Most often in the later half of the series. Albert even walks home in the rain in a depressed manner at one point.

This happens in the 25th episode of Death Note, which has an unusually poetic kick to it overall. At a moment of high drama, it instantly becomes Dramatic Thunder.

In episode 194 of Sailor Moon, rain begins to fall when Usagi collapses in tears because she can no longer bear the strain of wondering why her Love Interest in America hasn't written back to her at all (unbeknownst to her, he's dead).

In Monster, Tenma sinks to his knees to curse and bemoan the cruel fate that made him the savior of a murderer in the middle of a rainstorm. It's very sad, but the water getting on his pants is like the clothing equivalent of They Wasted a Perfectly Good Sandwich.

In Robotech/Super Dimension Fortress Macross, one of the episodes is called (A) Rainy Night, and is just that, a rather restrained, remarkably mature (in the proper sense of the word) conversation takes place between two of the major female characters about their love lives past and present, while a soaking rain comes down outside. One of the women is involved in a very dysfunctional relationship with a mecha officer, and the other tells her the story of how she met and got together with a by-then-deceased pilot. No explosions, no gunfire, not much comic relief, the entire episode is conversation and memories of a deceased character.

Played straight in Berserk after Guts awakens four days after the Eclipse and has a huge Freak Out! after fully realizing what had occurred. The chapter is aptly called "Awakening to a Nightmare".

Code Geass: The entire colour palette is overlaid with grey after Shirley meets Lelouch having missed her date with him because she had to identify her father's body. Whose death Lelouch was responsible for. And things just get worse from there.

In Marginal Prince, Joshua sings four times in the course of the series. Twice the songs are about his feelings and despair and of course it rains in torrents during these montages.

It's raining in the Tokyo of You're Under Arrest! when Ken Nakajima becomes the victim of the "rogue officers" that cause accidents deliberately, and breaks his leg. He's seen laying down on the rain-wet pavement and grabbing his injured leg, much to the horror of his friends.

It also rains during several early episodes of Oniisama e..., while are also those were Nanako is most bullied and harassed due to being accepted into the the Sorority. Also, it's under a heavy and cold rain that Rei waits for five hours for Fukiko, not knowing that it's one of Fukiko's cruel mind-games. It causes her to fall extremely sick.

Its sequel, UQ Holder! provides additional background. As revealed in chapter 148, in a timeline without Asuna present, Negi cannot win against Nagi Ialda in 2025. Yue, Nodoka, Rakan and Albireo Imma all become the Lifemaker's marionettes and Chisame blocks an attack for Negi. The next scene shows Negi slowly walking with his head low towards Eva's cottage, not caring whether he is soaking wet in the rain, that initially masks that he's crying.

In Kids on the Slope, when Kaoru finds out his father has only come to gather his stuff and won't have time for a proper visit, he heads up to his school's roof in the middle of a downpour to think about the things he wants to talk to his father about but won't get the time to, like him making new friends and wanting to know more about his Missing Mom.

Kubo generally uses rain to show when a character or group of characters (sometimes even all of Soul Society) have fallen into despair. The overriding symbolism of this belongs to Ichigo, where even his Empathic Weapon hates the rain because of the despair it represents inside Ichigo's soul. The origin of Ichigo's inner hollow lies with the proto-Arrancar White who only ever appeared when it rained and who merged with Ichigo's shinigami powers when passed down to him after hollowfying his Quincy mother. The reason why rain in Ichigo's inner world symbolises despair is because the inner hollow (as his real shinigami power) feeds on it to eliminate the source of that despair.

Second only to Ichigo, is Ryuuken. Flashbacks reveal a teenage Ryuuken was under enormous pressure to save the Quincy future. When Aizen's Hollowfication experiments bring Isshin and Masaki together, Ryuuken's life is destroyed in the process. As Masaki's designated future husband, Ryuuken's responsible for Masaki's wellbeing, but allows her to break the rules to save Isshin's life, leading to her Hollowfication. Forced to give her to the Shinigami to save her, his ability to protect the Quincy future in ruins, Ryuuken tries to walk away from the Quincies forever, stopped only by his future wife Kanae, whose fate it is to die with Masaki six years before the main storyline. Ryuuken's been living in the rain ever since.

In Saki, in a preview sequence at the end of the first season, this is present in a scene that seems to imply that a rift will eventually form between Saki and Nodoka; their backs are to each other, and one of the gifts they got for each other has been dropped in a puddle.

In one of the Dragon Ball Z movies, it was raining heavily when Future Trunks turned super saiyan for the fist time after finding the dead body of his Big Brother Mentor.

Used during two particularly tragic events in Tokyo Ghoul. It is raining when Mrs. Fueguchi takes her daughter out, but is played as a happy moment right up until the Investigators corner them. The skies quickly darken, with the bright colors muted as she makes a Heroic Sacrifice to give Hinami time to escape. The trope returns in full force in the final arc of the original series, raining heavily throughout the CCG raid of Anteiku, which concludes on a particularly bleaknote.

The seventh episode of THE iDOLM@STER: Cinderella Girls has dark, constant rain for most of the episode. Appropriately, it's one where most of the characters are feeling down.

In Hidamari Sketch's tanabata episode, Sae gets angry with Hiro to where they aren't seen together at all, and Sae keeps visiting Yuno and Miyako's classroom at the breaks. It rains the entire time until the mood is brought back up. Twice, characters say the weather reflects what's going on at Hidamari Apartments: Once while it's raining, and once after.

In another episode, Yuno and Miyako go to the convenience store, thinking they have time before the rain comes. They don't, as it comes down while they're inside. Worse, Miyako learns that the store isn't carrying nikuman, making her sad. On the way home, she says that the rain in the sky is like the rain in her heart, but then her foot impacts a puddle, cheering her up as she begins to run the rest of the way back, splashing puddles on the way.

It started raining in Sore ga Seiyuu! after Futaba found out that Rin would be replacing her in a roll that she really wanted to reprise. Ichigo even lampshaded it, pointing out that the weather forecast had said it was supposed to be sunny out.

This happened for Fate in Magical Girl Lyrical Nanoha A's when she was saying goodbye to Alicia in her dream world. It was also raining when Vita (during her hunt for Linker Cores) talked about how terrified she was of the possibility of Hayate dying. The movie upgraded the later scene to a full on thunderstorm.

It's raining in episode seven of ViVid Strike! after Rinne defeats Miura. Later combined with Battle in the Rain in episode ten when Rinne's self loathing reaches it's peak during her fight with Fuka (the episode is even titled "Rain").

In Lady Jewelpet, it was pouring when Luea was abandoned by her first Petit Lady Diana, who had to run away to avoid being chosen for a life she didn't want. Whenever it rains, Luea is reminded of what happened.

In School Rumble, it starts to rain just as Eri is heading home from a shopping trip with the ingredients she needs to cook dinner for her often-absent father. Suddenly her father pulls up in front of her in his limousine- but rather than being there to pick her up, he tells her that something has come up and he has to leave Japan at once, so he won't be able to have dinner with her after all. She tells him she understands, but when he drives off again and leaves her there, the rain rapidly gets heavier as she just stands there miserably. Luckily, that's the moment Harimashowed up behind herwith his umbrella...

Voices of a Distant Star: It is raining heavily when Noboru tries to gather the resolve to let go of Mikako. And then the message she had sent 1 year ago arrives; by the time he finishes reading it, so does the rain.

Comic Books

Justified in The Sandman where the Dreaming reflects Dream's emotions. After Thessaly dumps him we see him simply standing and moping in continuous rain. Mervyn complains about this causing people to have dreams of existential angst and everyone in the Dreaming to get wet, while Lucien remarks that after Nada, the entire Dreaming was razed and stayed a wasteland for hundreds of years. In an interesting twist, the landscape does not change after he is forced to kill Orpheus although he is obviously upset and grieving.

It rains as Littlefoot of The Land Before Time finds his mother after her fight with the Sharptooth. It starts to rain harder as she dies.

Just as Scrooge McDuck is loaded to a police van because he "illegally" entered his Money Bin (which is now Dijon's, thanks to him stealing the genie's lamp) in DuckTales the Movie: Treasure of the Lost Lamp a storm is heard. Then, at prison he mourns as rain falls and it finishes just as Scrooge makes a plan to infiltrate the Money Bin.

A slightly different variation of this tropes plays out in The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh during the scene with Tigger glumly trudging away in the snow after Rabbit reminds him he couldn't bounce after he promised not to if he made it down from the tree. Because this takes place in the wintertime, it begins lightly snowing instead of raining.

The Powerpuff Girls' movie has them left alone when the Professor doesn't pick them up from school (he got arrested), leaving them to walk home. As they sadly trod their way, it starts to rain.

Films — Live-Action

Blade Runner. Only at the end is there clear skies, and even then, it's still drizzling.

While this is also a fact of life for The Other Rainforest, The Goonies notably has this early on when Mr. Perkins arrives with paperwork regarding the imminent demolition of the kids' neighborhood.

So many John Cusack movies. So many. High Fidelity mixes this with Romantic Rain as one of Rob's many ex-girlfriends, Laura, tells him that her dad just died and minutes later have sex in the car.

A frequent motif of Akira Kurosawa. When his protagonists are at their lowest point, you can be sure rain will follow. Totally reversed in Ikiru; the protagonist is so happy to have achieved his final goal that not even heavy rain nor snow can stop him from rejoicing in a swing.

Parodied in Hot Shots! Part Deux with the flashback to when Ramata leaves Topper. She sends him a card to break up with him. When it sinks in, it starts to rain but entirely localised to where Topper is standing.

In The King's Speech, after an argument, Lionel tried to see Albert to apologize. At the time, Albert's brother was planning to abdicate his sovereignty to Albert, so he was told that the Duke was "too busy" and shown to the door, where it was pouring rain outside.

It was either parodied or used very cheesily in Alpha and Omega. When it looks like Kate has been trampled to death by caribou, everyone is very sad and the sky turns gray and there's thunder, then Kate wakes up, and instantly the sky turns blue again without a cloud in the sky.

In a sad scene from the film Ernest Goes to Camp, Ernest lampshades the appearance of a rainstorm with a song called "Gee I'm Glad It's Raining".

In The Hustler, Eddie Felson takes Sarah out to dinner, then tells her that he will be leaving town for a little while. Fearing that he's dumping her, Sarah bolts out of the restaurant and runs straight into a downpour.

It's a perfectly nice day when Michel arrives at the Empire State Building in Love Affair to meet his lover Terry after six months apart. But she gets hit by a car in front of the building and misses their rendezvous. When he finally has to leave at closing time after having waited for hours, rain is pouring in New York.

In Bruce Almighty, as the titular Bruce Nolan realizes how he turned his city an anarchist place and his life miserable, especially when he sees his ex-girlfriend crying over him, he walks through a road as rain falls and calls out for God just before a truck hits him unconscious and is next sent to a heavenly and neat place.

This shows up in Tempest: A Novel, when Jackson gets stuck in the past, it starts to rain. Justified in that time travel apparently causes rainy weather.

In Sanderson's The Stormlight Archive we have the Weeping - four straight weeks of steady rain, with just one rainless day in the middle. Since there are no highstorms, all Stormlight-based lights are slowly going out. And this is the period that always makes Kaladin depressed.

In Shaman Blues, the main character is fighting depression thorughout most of the story, and, fittingly, it rains nigh-all the time. Notably, when the intrigue is resolved and he's on his merry way to fixing his personal matters, it stops raining.

A huge rainstorm occurs halfway through Autobiography of Red, while Geryon is still reeling from Herakles breaking up with him. In a variant of this trope, it isn't so much an Empathic Environment as it is Irony: the storm is portrayed as dynamic and forceful, in contrast to Geryon's inertia.

In the Book of Ezra from The Bible, the period where God's people (the Jews that had returned from the Babylonian exile to Jerusalem) had to come to grips with being faithful to Him and divorce the foreign wives they had married also came during a period of heavy rain.

Live Action TV

Our Miss Brooks: In "The Pet Shop", a misunderstanding means that Miss Brooks and Mr. Boynton are likely to stand one another up for their date. At the last moment, Miss Brooks decides to go wait for Mr. Boynton outside the pet shop as promised. Miss Brooks waits, likely in vain, as a grey rain of depression falls. In a Crowning Moment of Heartwarming, Mr. Boynton also cannot stay away, and the misunderstanding is cleared. The rain likewise clears, and Miss Brooks and Mr. Boynton go out on their date.

The Killing is a show based on this trope. Every scene so far in the series has either been overcast, raining, or night. Granted, its set in Washington, but still...

The titular character jumps from the roof of St. Bart's hospital, apparently committing suicide, and as his best friend John tries to get to him the sky goes from partly cloudy to dark and rainy in a matter of minutes.

From the same episode: as John is describing the event to his therapist, and later when he's sitting alone in 221B, probably soon after the funeral, it's again raining heavily.

Happens in the first season finale of How I Met Your Mother when Lily calls-off her engagement to Marshall to follow her dreams. They eventually got better in the following season.

This instance was played with a bit in that it started out being a Happy Rain; Ted had spent the whole episode wanting it to rain so Robin wouldn't go on a corporate camping trip with a coworker who wanted to hook up with her. The rain was therefore seen as a good thing, complete with Ted and Robin finally getting together in the Romantic Rain, until Ted goes home the next morning and suddenly comes across the despondent Marshall.

And, in "Blink", "It's the same rain" during the heartbreaking conversation in the hospital between Sally Sparrow and Billy Shipton, who she last saw as a young man but was caught by the Angels and is now dying of old age. The rain stops and the music swells as she determines to puzzle out the mystery of the DVDs.

Zigzagged in Sesame Street: In the song "Rainy Day", the character likes the rain because it's important, but thinks that playing in the rain is unacceptable. Oscar and other grouches enjoy the rain, but that's because it makes other people unhappy...except for Ingrid, Humphrey, Gina, and a variety of kids who like to play in the rain...but Telly, Elmo and Zoe don't like it. However Stinky likes it..but that's because he is a plant.

Zoey 101: The episode "Chase's Grandma" has Chase sitting out in the rain when he learns that his grandmother had died.

In Monday Mornings, it's raining when a couple whose 2-month-old daughter has a brain tumour await information about her and try to decide about her treatment. They're lean on each other and stare out of a window, looking extremely sad.

NCIS. It is pouring throughout much of "Kill Ari" and "Kill Ari, 2", the episodes immediately following Caitlin Todd's murder and the team's efforts to find her killer. Also in "Hiatus" as the team grapples with Gibbs' injuries. And "Swan Song" when Mike Franks is killed.

Music

This is a common trope in country music to show that the singer is depressed or there is turmoil:

David Nail's "Let it Rain" involves the singer cheating on his wife and being thrown out into the rain (apparently inspired by the last scene of the movie "The Last Kiss").

Gary Allan's "Songs About Rain" is told from the point of view of an ex-boyfriend on his love's wedding day to someone else—and as he's driving around being depressed, all the radio will play are "songs about rain."

Rascal Flatts' "What Hurts the Most"; the singer mentions that the rain on the roof "don't bother me" but it fits with the mood of the song.

Carole King's song "Crying in the Rain" (also covered by a-ha) is about a person who's still not over a bad break-up and hopes it'll rain soon so they can cry underneath it and not let others know about their heartbreak.

Also "Standing In The Rain," about waiting outside in the cold rain for a date who doesn't show up.

Certainly at least invoked by "Cold Kentucky Rain".

"Sure Got Cold After The Rain Fell" by ZZ Top knowingly uses the country metaphor, being from Texas, although it's a blues song. However, it doubles in that the desert is cold after rain falls, what with all the wet sand and all.

Michael Jackson's "Stranger in Moscow" about loneliness and sadness has the opening line "I was wandering in the rain", the music video features Jackson in the pouring rain.

New Radicals "I Don't Wanna Die Anymore" features "A life of rain" and "It's gonna rain" The song is about depression after the failure of a relationship. It is not completely evident if the 'two months of fun, two years of pain' in the song refers to a two month relationship breaking up and two years of depression, or about a relationship that was fun for two months and abusive for two years, though the former is far more likely. The narrator wants the girl back because otherwise he's going to kill himself.

"Blue Heart Of Texas" by David Francey. He's feeling low about a failed relationship and the "pouring down rain" is not helping his mood.

Persona 5: Played with. "Beneath the Mask", a slow, quiet ballad where the singer laments their Loss of Identity plays on any day it rains.

In The Sims, Sims will get a minus to their happiness when they get rained on.

In The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, during the Recovered Memory fittingly titled "Despair," it is raining as Link and a tearful Zelda are running from Calamity Ganon's vicious massacre that saw the deaths of King Rhoam, the Champions, and everyone in Castle Town.

Web Animation

Urban Fantasy web series Broken Saints uses this in Chapter 14, Act 2, as one of our heroes, Kamimura, walks alone through a very depressing and disturbing section of downtown Coast City—reflecting his own display of sorrow at what he sees around him.

Web Comics

In Everyday Heroes, when Jane is released from prison, she walks away from her family (and her old life as a villain) through a cold February rain, alone.

Various Happenings opens with this, Cassandra soaked and exasperated as she stops to rest at a bus stop.

Stand Still, Stay Silent: The Odense hospital flashback, which gives quite bad news about the Year 0 Rash cure and shows its focus characters outright giving up on their battle against the Rash, shows the meeting going on while it's raining outside.

In Winx Club S4 episode 24 it starts raining after The Wizards of the Black Circle escape after having used the gift of life on a dead flower, taking away the Winx's only chance to save Nabu who had sacrificed himself to save the Earth fairies.

My Little Pony: Friendship Is Magic has this in several episodes, including "Magical Mystery Cure" when Twilight laments the switching of her friend's cutie marks, "Rarity Takes Manehattan" when Rarity thinks her friends have abandoned her, and "Testing, Testing, 1-2-3" when Rainbow despairs of passing the Wonderbolts history test.

The Beatles episode "Good Day Sunshine" has Ringo thinking he's a jinx. It depresses him so much that a rain cloud appears over his glass and fills it with water. He even think he's the reason it starts raining during the boys' excursion to Coney Island.

Community

Tropes HQ

TVTropes is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. Permissions beyond the scope of this license may be available from thestaff@tvtropes.org. Privacy Policy